


Some People Call This Wisdom

by debwalsh



Series: Deb’s Fictober Surprise! [13]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Friends Giving Advice, M/M, Misunderstandings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-19
Updated: 2018-10-19
Packaged: 2019-08-04 13:14:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,360
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16347389
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/debwalsh/pseuds/debwalsh
Summary: With Steve and Bucky taking a time out from each other, their friends step in to try to help.  Some are more helpful than others, of course.





	Some People Call This Wisdom

**Author's Note:**

> I really need to thank my readers, and especially Tigrislilium, for calling me on my bullshit. You are absolutely right that Steve had complicity here. I’m very much like him, in that I hold back, thinking it shouldn’t bother me this much, until I blow, leaving everyone around me dumbfounded by the explosion and resulting shrapnel. This is the great benefit of letting Try Harder, Next Time breathe a bit before I finished the next piece. I hope you’ll like the direction the boys and their friends are taking.

“Some people call this wisdom.”

Bucky looked at Tony Stark draped across the mantle of his fireplace, family photos in silver frames glinting in the light, and snorted.“Some people call this bullshit.” 

Pepper Potts shook her head where she sat in a comfy chair.“Some people call this crazy.”

Bruce Banner nodded, then announced from his seat by the window, “I need a drink.”Everybody agreed in principle on the sentiment, but not one moved to act on it.

Except for Tony, who perked up.“I’ll have a martini.Dirty.”

Bruce shook his head, grimacing.“It’s a figure of speech.It isn’t even noon, Tony.”

“I’ve been up all night.That makes it, like late, for me.”

Pepper chuckled darkly. “That makes it, like you should get your ass in bed, for you.”

Bucky glanced around the room, the sleekly decorated, very high, very expensive lounge area of Tony, Pepper, and Bruce’s penthouse.“Why did I come here again?”

Tony nudged his tinted lenses down his nose a little more so he could, you know, look down his nose at Bucky.“You came here looking for advice for the lovelorn.Or in your case, I dunno.What is it when two people love each other, but one of them really, really fucks up?”

Bruce grimaced again.“Trauma.”

“You should not trust Tony with your love life,” Pepper warned him, shifting uncomfortably in her chair.

“I don’t.I came here to talk to you, Pepper.”

“Finally!” Bruce exclaimed. “Some sense in the world. Asking Tony for advice about anything but quantum theory is insane, just like asking for an apocalypse.”

Bucky couldn’t hold back the sudden snicker.“Yeah. Like a zombie apocalypse. Where Tony eats your brain.”

“Yech!I’ll have you know I have higher standards than that.At least Nobel level brains for me.”

Bucky deflated quickly, and sighed heavily.“This isn’t helping me with my Steve-sized problem.”

Pepper looked at him kindly for a moment before correcting, “I think this is really a James-sized problem.”

“Whatever, it’s a big problem.”

Tony chuckled. “You’re not so big.”

“Having Steve living in someone else’s apartment because he doesn’t want to come home to me is a problem of world-shattering proportions.”

“Got me there.If I did something that made Pepper stay away, I ... I’m not sure what I would do.Not sure I could survive that, really.”

Bruce smiled gently, and said, “You’d survive, but you wouldn’t be happy.”

“No, I wouldn’t.But I don’t see the me I am today surviving.You make me better.You make me want to be better.”

Bucky sat up at that, eyes wide.“I.Wow.Tony did say something helpful.”

Preening, Tony demanded, “Really?How?”

‘Well ... that’s how Steve makes me feel.He always has, since the day I met him.I was just a kid.He was a kid who stood up for other kids, who risked himself to protect and defend.I saw him get the snot beat out of him by this bully twice his size.But because he was defending this other kid, he kept getting up.He could barely stand, he was half unconscious, and yet he would not give ground to this kid.It was only then that I stepped in to help.I didn’t start it on my own, but he inspired me to join in.”

Pepper asked, “When was the last time you said something like that to him, James?”

“I ... I don’t remember.Honestly, I’m not sure I ever told him that story.I live it, y’know?He reminds me of it all the time.But I don’t think I ever said anything to him.”

She nodded to herself, then spoke with calm conviction, “That’s where you need to start.You need to communicate with Steve.You need to tell him how you really feel.You said he was hurt and angry about this game you liked to play.About how you always treated it as your win, his loss.”

“Worse.Not just his loss.But that he was too inept to play.I always assumed he was enjoying the game with me, and the teasing was part of the game.I wasn’t paying close enough attention to realize not only was he not playing the game, he hated the game. And the way I treated him over it.How could I have missed that?i know Steve better than anyone.Hell, I thought I knew Steve better than I know myself.”

“Well, maybe that’s the problem.You think you know him, you think you know yourself, so you’re not paying attention. You’re making assumptions, and making decisions based on those assumptions.But you’re missing the reality of the now, because you don’t think you need to pay attention to what’s right in front of you.You haven’t been open to having your assumptions challenged, or even replaced by a reality that is in fact always changing.”

“Pepper has a point,” Bruce commented.

“I know.I realized after it sank in what I’d done that I wasn’t in the moment with Steve.I made up my mind on how it all fit together, and I didn’t pay attention to notice I was fucking wrong.”

Tony pushed himself away from the mantle and started to fidget.“This is all too feeling-y for my taste.”

Exasperated, Bruce snapped, “Why am I not surprised?”

Bucky looked at him with something akin to pity, mixed with worry.“Someday, Tony, you’re going to find yourself in the same position I am.The person you love will have just had enough of you.”

Tony rounded on Pepper, his arms held with, palms open.“Is that true?Would you ever get tired of me?”

She considered the question for a moment, leaning her cheek onto her fist, elbow pressed into the arm of the chair.“Tired of you?I don’t know.Had enough of you?Quite possible.”

While Tony snorted and twitched at the thought, Bruce explained quietly, “It’s not a matter of being tired of you.It’s a matter of not being able to tolerate something about you anymore.When the effort outweighs the benefit.That’s the point Steve hit. It’s not something you can quantify in advance.There are so many other factors that come into play, so many other potential stressors.If something hadn’t happened the day before, something small but just enough, maybe Steve wouldn’t have reacted the way he did that day.Or, if there had been more pressure from another source, he could have snapped sooner.The fact is, he reached that critical mass point.”

Tony pivoted toward Bruce, the St. Vitas dance of denial quelled abruptly.“When you put it like that, Bruce, I get it.It’s chaos in action.”

Bucky chuckled fondly, but the laugh didn’t reach his eyes, which were drawn and shadowed, sad.“I’m glad you found a scientific explanation.But what do I do?How do I get my husband back?”

“No presents,” Tony warned, waggling his finger toward Bucky.

“I pretty much figured that one out on my own, genius.”

Bruce nodded agreement.“Yeah, gifts have got a pretty negative connotation right now.You’re going to have to ease him back into gifts.”

“Steve is really good about giving gifts.Not just for the big stuff, but for the little stuff, too.Sometimes just because.He’ll see something and it will make him smile, so he’ll get it, to make me smile, too.”

Pepper smiled warmly.“He calls those ‘day brighteners.’I love that idea.Just something simple, something small, to make someone day a little brighter.”

“Yeah, so i was thinking maybe I should do something like that -“

Pepper shook her head definitively.“No.”

“No?”

“No.It’s not you,You’ve never been a big gift-giver.The big occasions, yes, but your gifts have never really had the personal touch that Steve’s gifts have.”

“Hey!’

“I’m not trying to insult you, I’m just being honest.Right now, honest is more important than stuffing your ego.”

“Okay, I’ll give you that.”

“No, gifts aren’t the right route to take.I think you need to be thinking about actions, instead.Kindnesses.Little things to make things easier, to make him feel cherished.Things you can repeat, make routine.”

“Huh.Like what?”

“Little things.Not grand gestures.Small things that you can maintain, that you can do on your own.”

“Like ...?”

“Think about it.What’s Steve’s day normally like?What irritates or frustrates him?Where could he use a little extra help?Or encouragement?Maybe something to make him feel better about himself?Or just a laugh now and again?”

“Huh.”

“Sounds like homework,” Tony complained in the lull in the action. He’d been swiveling his head between Pepper and Bucky throughout the entire exchange.Bruce had simply settled back in his window seat, where he had a clear view of both Pepper and Bucky.

But Pepper didn’t rise to Tony’s bait, instead treating his comment as a legitimate observation.“In a way, it is.Because you can’t act on any of that if you don’t pay attention to Steve.You have to learn all those things about the Steve who exists today, not the Steve you knew last week or last year, or in high school.What is the one thing that makes Steve crazy right now?Do you know?”

“No, I don’t.But I think I know what I have to do first.”

“And what’s that?”

“I need to ask my husband out on a date.And really treat it as a date, like a first date.I need to ask him questions - not an interview - but questions about the things that matter to him.I need to listen.”

Tony tried to make himself look wise, intoning, “Grasshopper, you have much to learn, but you have learned the art of learning.”

Bruce snorted again.“Way to go cheesy.”

“You have to pay attention, James.Pay attention and let Steve know that you want to know about who he is today, what matters to him.That he matters to you.”

Bucky looked around the room, hooking a thumb toward Pepper.“Now, see?That’s what some people call wisdom.”

&&&

Riley got Steve settled in the guest room, and stood in the doorway holding a fuzzy fleece throw while Steve sat wearily on the edge of the bed.Steve looked like he’d been run over by a steamroller that backed up and went back for seconds.Rile shook his head.His life was full of dumb boys.He drew in a fortifying breath, and jumped in.

“You know we’re gonna have to talk about the elephant in the room, right, sugar?”

Steve looked up at him in confusion.“What do you mean?”

“Hunky Hubby don’t listen, but Sweet Stevie don’t say nothin’, am I right?”

Steve shrugged.“I tell him it bothers me.”

“It bothers me, or it hurts me?Because those are two very different things.And you know that boy would never want to hurt you, right?But annoy you?Please.He and Sam could write a book.”

Steve snickered softly, a tiny smile changing his features in that moment.“Okay. Yeah.Sometimes I even egg him on.But I don’t in this.”

“But you also don’t say the words.You let it build up until you can’t take it anymore.You let it get out of control.Doesn’t that make you the teeniest bit responsible, too?”

“I ... it shouldn’t bother me, right?He doesn’t mean anything by it.But it does.I keep thinking I should just ignore how it stings.How it hurts.I’m being childish, I -“

“You need to stop thinking your feelings don’t matter.You need to stop thinking your feelings are less important than your beautiful husband’s right to be an asshole.”

“He’s not -“

“He is.And frankly, sometimes so are you.Everybody’s got a little bit of asshole in them.Some more than others, but ... the thing is, you gotta take some blame here.For not making your feelings clear, for not speaking up loud and clear.You can’t expect him to read your mind when he’s clearly not listening to you in the first place.Y’gotta make him listen.Y’gotta make him hear.”

“Why is it my responsibility?” Steve asked grumpily, getting that mulish expression everyone knew and hated so well - Stroppy Steve.

“Because it takes two to have a relationship, sweetie.And if you’re clear in what you want, and he’s still an asshole?I’ve seen that uppercut - deck him.”

That earned a full out laugh, and Steve kept laughing until he started to sob.Then Riley was right there, draping the fuzzy throw around his shoulders and pulling him into a side embrace.

“Get it out.Get those tears out, and you’ll see clearer.And then you can figure out what it is you want, what limits you’re willing to accept. Then you two can start to work it out.”

“I wanna work it out,” Steve hiccuped.

“I know.And I know you two will.Sam is right - the two of you make the rest of us feel inadequate.But you’ve bought the illusion, too.You two aren’t perfect.You may be soulmates but you’re still human, you’re still men with all the stupid that comes with that.You have to work at being a couple.You have to recognize that his shit really does smell, and you have rank morning breath.You acknowledge the warts, you talk about them, you figure out how to work through them, or around them, or fix them.And you do it together.Right?”

“How’d you get to be so wise?”

“You think I’m wise?I’m an old soul, honey.This isn’t my first turn around the dance floor. Sam, too. I think we’ve been together in more than one lifetime. You, too.But you still got some stuff to work out.And you’re gonna, right?‘Cos my sister is coming to visit for Christmas, and she always stays with us.So unless you want a roommate with bunions, you’re gonna get yourself home to that boy of yours before then.”

“Yeah.Yeah I will.”

END

**Author's Note:**

> Comments mean the world to me, and i am so grateful to have readers who will criticize as well as compliment. It is a gift I never take for granted.


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